World Bank -- Wolfowitz?!?!

PARIS, March 16 – President Bush’s nomination of Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz as the next president of the World Bank was met with much surprise, little enthusiasm and some outright opposition in Europe, where he is best known as a leading architect of a conflict deeply unpopular here, the Iraq war.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41350-2005Mar16.html

WTF? Ow, my head’s about to explode.

Bright side: maybe it’ll permanently discredit the World Bank for the left and we can shove through reforms next president. Downside: Iraq demonstrated he’s clueless, so the third world better get ready for a bumpy ride.

Welcome to moonbat Hell! Dude was right on everything in Iraq and reforming the Middle East - I’m sure he’ll do a great job.

Its pretty clear what the neo-con agenda is with the appointment of Wolfy and Bolton; essentially to politize international bodies, which would further render them invalid in the eyes of conservatives (this in the long run), and if that is impossible, use their ‘inside man’ to marginalize them as best they can.

Many people find terrorism frightening, and the threat of mass terrorism is reason enough for military action in many cases, but i find it frightening how eager this administration and the intellectual hawks driving it are to remove any obstacles to their unilateral power.

Does this mean Bono is out?

Is “Major contributor to the US being embroiled in a foreign war” a requirement to be in charge of the World Bank or something?

Maybe Bush wants him out of the team because he’s shown he can’t plan a military operation properly but wants to reward him for his loyalty. He may see the World Bank as a sinecure.

FWIW, “old Europe” can and probably will veto Wolfowitz.

Quotes from Mr. Right:

“There’s a lot of money to pay for this that doesn’t have to be U.S. taxpayer money, and it starts with the assets of the Iraqi people…and on a rough recollection, the oil revenues of that country could bring between $50 and $100 billion over the course of the next two or three years…We’re dealing with a country that can really finance its own reconstruction, and relatively soon.”

“I am reasonably certain that they will greet us as liberators.”

“I would expect that even countries like France will have a strong interest in assisting Iraq in reconstruction.”

“Every time we get a briefing on the war plan, it immediately goes down six different branches to see what the scenarios look like. If we costed each and every one, the costs would range from $10 billion to $100 billion.”

“To assume we’re going to pay for it all is just wrong…”

“…it’s hard to conceive that it would take more forces to provide stability in post-Saddam Iraq than it would take to conduct the war itself and to secure the surrender of Saddam’s security forces and his army. Hard to imagine . . .”

Feith and Wolfowitz out of defense, I’ll say Rumsfeld is out by the end of the year…

…and you folks are still bitching? :lol:

Its really fasinating to me, this headline. What’s their angle, and whose angle is it? Its just such a bizare choice of candidate; its like he just nominated Newt Gingrich as the head of National Science Foundation or something. Either its some Grand Plan by Bush and Co., or its Wolfowitz’s own schemes - maybe he feels that now mired in Iraq he has both ‘done what he set out to do’ and that our chances of invading another country are slim, so he wants to move on to some other position of power to further his own agenda.

If his nomination is intended as one to be vetoed, what is the angle then? Call Europe anti-American? Anti-Semetic? What sort of brownie points to you get for such a maneuver as that, and with who?

I’m clearly missing some behind the scenes logic.

Oops! http://money.cnn.com/2005/03/03/news/international/wolfowitz.reut/index.htm

It was funny while it lasted.

Interesting article, Desslock. But it’s dated 3/3/05.

Is it an omen of Wolfowitz’ chances, or has something happened behind the scenes?

I was highlighting how wrong CNN was.